According to Deadline, Jay Ellis (Top Gun: Maverick, Insecure) is slated to develop both a true-crime podcast and an original scripted series entitled Freeway Phantom about the murders of six young Black girls in the Washington D.C. area during the early 1970’s. The murders were conducted by “The Freeway Phantom,” a still unidentified serial killer who murdered five girls and one woman between April 1971 and September 1972.
The podcast series is set to launch this spring on May 17. It will be produced under Ellis’ banner of Black Bar Mitzvah, as well as TenderfootTV and iHeartPodcasts, with renowned public radio host veteran Celeste Headlee (On Second Thought, The Takeaway) serving as the series’ narrator.
Freeway Phantom will retell how all six of the Freeway Phantom’s victims were murdered and disposed of alongside busy capital highways throughout 1971 and 1972. The podcast will also cover the killer’s taunting messages to the police and hauntingly frequent calls to his victim’s grieving families. To this day, the Freeway Phantom has never been caught.
The series will purportedly also bring to life new evidence surrounding the Freeway Phantom case, evidence which Deadline claims has the ability to crack the case wide open. Headlee herself has spent the past two years searching through old boxes and documents for clues. She has also interviewed many of the victims’ family members, who are still tormented by this string of murders all these years later.
Headlee has also worked closely with retired D.C. police detective Romaine Jenkins, who spent a large portion of her career in law enforcement searching for clues on the Freeway Phantom case. Throughout the podcast, Jenkins and Headlee will also weigh in on racial disparities, the evolving of strategies for identifying killers, and the lack of trust between law enforcement and local communities — an issue which still persists in our modern society.
As Deadline reports, Ellis and his team of producers are already drafting up a scripted series based on the podcast. When asked about the multimedia project, Headlee stated, “This is an engrossing story, not only because of how much has changed in the way we track down serial killers, but also what has not changed. Our effort to protect the public is still hampered by racism, mistrust between communities and authorities, and a lack of cooperation among those whose job is to protect and serve. This series answers so many tough questions and asks just as many.”